"Kafka's fiction vividly evokes bizarre situations: a commercial traveller is turned into an insect, a banker is arrested by a mysterious court, and a singing mouse becomes the heroine of her nation. Attending both to Kafka's crisis-ridden life and to the subtleties of his art, Ritchie Robertson shows how his work explores such characteristically modern themes as the place of the body in culture, the power of institutions over people, and the possibility of religion after Nietzsche had proclaimed 'the death of God'. This up-to-date and accessible portrait of a fascinating author shows us ways to read and make sense of his perplexing and absorbing work."--Jacket.

Life and myth -- Reading Kafka -- Bodies -- Institutions -- The last things.